Confessions from a Holiday Camp

by Timothy Lea

“And here, too,” she says pointing to her bristols. “You see?”

  “Smashing.”

  I slip my arms round her waist and her mouth comes up to meet mine like it is late for an appointment. She tastes of peppermints. I wonder what the rest of her tastes like. I run my hand over her comfortable arse and she starts probing the small of my back with her fingers.

  “I like you,” she says.

  I think she means it, too, because she keeps trying to bite little pieces off me as souvenirs. This is something I am not very partial to but I don’t say anything; mainly because both my lips are being nibbled like lettuce leaves in the mouth of a highly-strung rabbit. I advance my tongue but this is thrust back firmly in its place by an organ of greater power.

  “Bed,” she says firmly and walks me backwards in a clumsy tango step. I am about to topple on to it gratefully when she releases her grip and seizing the bedstead, rattles it viciously until two bolts and a large cockroach zig-zag across the room.

  “Squeakee too much,” she says, and before the dust has settled she has torn off the mattress and thrown it on to the floor. By the cringe! Talk about ripping telephone directories in half. This bird would make Joan Rhodes trade in her chest expanders. And she looked so bloody docile in the Fooderama, too. Appearances can be deceiving, I think to myself as she smiles encouragingly and starts tugging her jumper over her head. Underneath she is wearing a bra that might have been made out of two U.S.A.F. parachutes – and brother, there could not have been enough material left over to knit your kid sister a thimble cosy. What a pair! Spain’s answer to the world melon shortage. Just to be in their presence is an honour but to actually touch them! My greedy hand stretches out and disappears into the cleavage up to the wrist. Caramba! Or whatever they say in these parts, this girl is a flesh avalanche!

  Maybe avalanche is the wrong word, because they are usually cold, aren’t they? Little Carmen is not cold, oh dear me, no. I have hardly closed with her before she chucks me on the mattress like it is the final of the Spanish Open Judo championships and I have been lucky to get this far. Queen Kong isn’t in it as she stands over me and starts gyrating her tits like a lady gorilla trying to tell you something. Her skirt is dignified calf-length but it soon drops a damn sight lower than that as she pulls the ripcord and reveals a minute pair of silk panties adorned with an American Sergeant’s stripes pointing to her you-know-what. I would like to be able to whistle “God Bless America” but I am getting a bit short of breath.

  “Now: Lovefock,” she says, and she drops on me demonstrating a technique that would turn Mick McManus Hughie Greene with envy. Her hand dives down the front of my jeans like she has left her pet ferret there, and all the lights go out. At first, I think I have fainted, or that ten years as the slave of the five fingered widow have caught up with me, but Carmen is quick to offer reassurance.

  “Crappy generator pack up again. We do it in dark.”

  I don’t know where she gets the “we” from. Every time I try and get in on the act, I am slapped down like a cheeky puppy. I don’t know whether it is intentional, but she starts to pull my jeans off over my suedes, and you don’t run a hundred yards in that condition, I can tell you. Maybe she thinks I am going to try and sneak off under cover of darkness. Her fears are groundless because, though wary, I can still think of five million other things I would less like to be doing – or being done by as is more nearly the case.

  “Aah,” she breathes, drawing forth the fruits of my jockey briefs. “Now we have fun.” Before I can tell her where I packed the paper hats she clambers aboard and snuffs out Percy with a flick of her hips. Where her panties have gone I don’t know. Maybe she has a release mechanism.

  “Hold tight, cookee,” she breathes. “It ees going to be a bumpee ride.”

  She is not kidding and I can understand why she did not reckon the bedstead was up to it. Have you ever seen one of those electric do-das that workmen use for pounding down road surfaces? Well, imagine two of those side by side, and you have some idea of the punishment her big end is dishing out. In the moonlight I can see her tits swinging dangerously near my head and it is getting so I am terrified to move. God knows what they must be thinking next door because the noise is terrific, even without the bed. Carmen is not a silent lover and her voice, well lubricated by my Scotch, is belting out a few traditional Spanish chants. They have a very persistent beat which is soon more than can be said for me as the minutes tick by and the mighty pelvis continues to batter down on my sensitive body. Even the realisation that I am poking for England is insufficient to make me hold back. Patriotism is not enough, as I remember reading somewhere. A few more ferocious wriggles and I am adding my own delighted gurgles to the general uproar. Bang! Bang! Bang! The noise of somebody bashing against the wall ripples over our gasping bodies and I run my finger down Carmen’s sweat-slippering backbone and whisper self-protectingly in her ear.

  “That was wonderful but you must not miss the ferry.”

  “Ferry gone,” says my love comfortingly. “I stay here with you tonight. Where is the whisky?”

  Blimey! Talk about “A Night on the Bare Mountain”! That composer bloke had obviously never tangled with our Carmen. What an appetite! By the time dawn breaks I feel like I have been run through a combine harvester a couple of times.

  Somehow I break away from her and, mumbling that I am going for a swim, make for the door.

  “When you come back, I bring you breakfast in bed – Spaneesh style,” she calls after me. That is all I need and I am practically running as I approach the beach. A nice swim is just what I require to pull myself together and prepare for the day ahead. It looks as if it is going to be hot, too.

  Just how hot I have not realised. I have no sooner discarded my shorts and am prepared to dunk sizzling Percy in the briny when I hear a sound calculated to strike terror into the bravest heart.

  “Well, if it isn’t my favourite male chauvinist pig posing for the cover of Health and Efficiency. Fancy making it a tableau?”

  I whip round to see Nan and Nat advancing on me from behind a rock. They are, inevitably, starkers, and looking mean with it. You don’t have to be a clairvoyant to know what they are thinking – just dirty-minded and good at jumping to conclusions.

  “Listen, girls,” I whine. “I’m not feeling so good. I hardly slept a wink last night. I think I’ve got a fever.”

  “We have the cure for all your ills.”

  “Not this one,” I yelp, “now step aside, please. I want to swim.”

  “Back to the foetal fluid, huh? I always reckoned you were a mother’s boy at heart, Timmy.”

  “Leave my feet and my mother out of this,” I tell them sharply – you can take so much, can’t you? – “I’m a sick man.”

  “Only because you are burdened by so many bourgeois hang-ups. You want to make love with us, don’t you?”

  “No, no!” I howl.

  “Of course you do. Don’t fight it. Let it all hang out.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t keep saying that. Look, I’ve told you once, I had a bad night, I’m tired, I’m ill. I just want to swim. Now, please! Be good girls and let me get on with it in peace.”

  They consider me for a moment.

  “Maybe he’s a repressed homosexual.”

  “I’m not repressed,” I say, taking umbrage immediately.

  “But you are a homosexual.”

  “No. No!” I shriek.

  “Come on, admit it. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. You can have relationships with girls as well, you know. Just try and imagine that we’re a couple of fellahs.”

  “I could never do that, even if I wanted to. Honestly, please believe me. I am not bent. I am just tired, knackered, bushed, whacked!”

  “Why do you hate women so much?”

  “Me, hate women? Don’t make me laugh. Some of my best friends are women. My mother for instance.”

  “Did you hear that, Nan? Back to the womb again.”

  “Oh, fo
rget it.”

  I start walking into the sea. Maybe if I walk far enough I can end it all.

  “Don’t worry, Timmy.” Nat’s hand slips through my arm.

  “We’re going to help you.” Nan has grabbed the other one.

  “Now listen girls—”

  “Chicks aren’t so bad, Timmy.”

  I am now sandwiched between them in two feet of water. You may have seen something like it on the front cover of Funfrall Continental’s brochure. Something. “Once you get used to them.” They are beginning to nibble me and do indescribably naughty things with their hands. They must have been swimming already because there are small drops of water glistening along their firm brown shoulders.

  “Look, Nat,” says Nan. “He’s crying.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “You pull the knob behind the seat,” says Ted.

  “Oh, I thought you pushed it,” I say.

  “Yeah, so did the last eight blokes who were in my place, I reckon. Blimey! Talk about pong.”

  We are discussing the toilet arrangements which are decidedly “traditional”.

  “They ought to print some instructions in English.”

  “It wouldn’t make any difference if they did. My inheritance still hasn’t moved and the flies are standing three abreast on each other’s shoulders. What time does the water go on?”

  “I dunno. I just work here.”

  “You must be the only thing that does. What a carve-up. God knows what it’s going to be like when the paying customers arrive.”

  We are sitting on the verandah of the Candelight Casino to which I have fled after the Deadly Duo have finished “liberating” me. That was their word for it, anyway.

  “You alright?” says Ted. “You’re looking a bit pale.”

  I laugh hollowly and continue to flick through my cornflakes in case there are any more ants lurking there. The tinned milk failed to drown the first three hundred.

  “I didn’t sleep very well,” I say.

  “Hot, wasn’t it?”

  “Very.”

  “Still, I suppose we’re going to get used to it.”

  “I hope so. Oh, by the way, Ted, what does Isla de Moscas mean?”

  “‘The Island of Flies’. Why?”

  “That’s what they used to call this place.”

  “What do you mean ‘used to’? Have you seen my bathroom? Blooming heck. I’ve heard of Spanish Fly – this place ought to be called Spanish Flies.”

  “That’s very good, Ted.”

  “Thank you, Timmy. Flattery will get you anywhere with me. Incidentally, who’s been filling you in on the local history? I heard you were giving a Tupperware party in your room last night. Was it one of your guests?”

  “There was only one.”

  “That’s not what I heard. They reckoned you were breaking in wild horses later on. Don’t tell me you’ve started indulging in the dreaded hanky panky already?”

  “No, Ted, I was moving the furniture around.”

  “Sounds an interesting way of doing it.”

  “Yes. Look, Ted, talking of ‘hanky panky’. Who’s the Francis figure round here?”

  “A bloke called Grunwald.”

  “I haven’t seen him since we got here.”

  “You won’t, either. Not until he’s finished the three bottles of brandy he took with him when he locked himself in his bungalow.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Nothing. Nobody else is going to do anything. I’ve checked the kitchen and we’re alright for potatoes and tinned milk. There’ll be no shortage of tea and chips. I’m not a plumber or a can of fly spray so there’s bugger all else I can do.”

  “But hadn’t we better do something to get the place organised?”

  “Organised!? Listen, mate. This is Isla de Amor: Love Island. You don’t have to organise anything here. Just let ’em get on with it; it sounds as if you were setting a very good example last night—oops! Talk of the diablo. Look who’s coming.”

  I follow his eyes and there is Carmen padding towards us carrying a piece of paper in her hand. “You sweem long way,” she says to me reproachfully. “I have flushed out toilets and got more stomach powder for you.”

  “Very kind of you, but I don’t have a stomach ache.”

  “Soon,” she says, nodding wisely. “Soon.”

  “Cheerful little darling, isn’t she,” says Ted. “What have you got there, love?”

  “Telegram for Senor Grun—Grun—you look.” She hands the paper to Ted.

  “Telegram! My goodness, what next? I thought a bloke ran out of the rocks with a message in a forked stick. Now, let’s see. ‘Arriving Island 14.30 hours. 7–7–72. Noggett’.”

  ‘I give telegram to Grun, Grun …” Carmen extends her hand.

  “Don’t bother, darling. I think we’d better call his room the Sick Bay from now on. Take him some chicken broth about dinner time.”

  “I no understand.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Man come from England in flying bird. He sort everything out.”

  In fact, man and woman arrive by flying bird. About four hours later than expected, a very damp and bedraggled Sidney and secretary limp on to the Island. We refrain from asking if he had a good trip but he tells us about it anyway.

  “Poxy plane wouldn’t start and then the bloody bus breaks down. You buggers didn’t go out of your way to meet us, did you?”

  “Your telegram didn’t arrive until this morning.”

  “Bloody marvellous. When did we send that, Marcia?”

  I check over Miss Trimbody for signs of mauling but it looks as if she has had a fairly Sid-free trip. No obvious bruises or torn garments.

  “Mid-day last Tuesday,” she says primly, flicking aside a damp curl.

  “Looks as if someone made a cock-up. Where’s Grunwald?”

  ‘Ill.”

  “Sick.”

  “You mean pissed as usual, I suppose. Where’s his chalet?”

  “Oh—er. I think—no—where …?”

  “Don’t mess about. I want to talk to someone about this place. We’ve got the public arriving in a few days you know. Now where is he?”

  So a small procession forms up and we all march round to Grunwald’s bungalow. The sun is sinking behind the corrugated iron roof and the only sound to be heard is that of a dog working over one of the dustbins behind the Passion Fooderama. It is very peaceful.

  “That one?” says Sid.

  We nod and Marcia sucks in her breath. Sid steps forward and taps on the door. Nothing happens. Sid knocks on the door. Still nothing happens. Sid bangs on the—“Shurrup!! Shurrup! Shurr-u-u-p!!!” The voice goes off like an explosion and the bungalow shudders as waves of abuse break through the wall. Grunwald is obviously well into the brandy. As if to prove the point, two empty bottles leave in quick succession via one of the windows, narrowly missing Marcia’s head. They are followed by a burst of drunken laughter accompanied by hysterical female giggles. Sid puts his shoulder to the door and we all crane forward to peer inside. Lying naked across the bed is Grunwald, his fat belly glistening with sweat and his limp cluster shaking in time with his laughter. Nan is lying starkers with her head on his hairy belly and Nat is standing up trying to pour herself a slug of brandy. Unfortunately, she is laughing so much that she cannot hold the glass steady. She tries to concentrate, bites her lip, screws up her eyes, then drops the bottle which shatters on the concrete floor. Now all three of them start laughing twice as loud. I glance at Marcia who is standing at my elbow. She is also biting her lip and I suspect she is getting a quiet kick from the proceedings. Interesting girl, Marcia.

  The back of Sid’s neck turns red and when he swings round we all fall down the steps of the bungalow. He chokes a couple of times, shuts the door as an afterthought and fixes Ted with his eye.

  “Right, Hotchkiss,” he says. “You’re in charge and your first job is going to be to get that bloody maniac off the island. Put him on an aeroplane.
It doesn’t matter where it’s going. Anywhere. And as for those two—those—”

  “You mean Sir Giles’ nieces?” I say hurriedly. Sidney wilts. “You’ll have to watch them,” he says weakly.

  In the next few days we watch the Deadly Duo systematically work their way through every male on the Island. This is not bad going when you consider that these are the days on which we interview waiters and barmen, and an extra sixty Spaniards come over from the mainland. Poor devils. It is pathetic to see them change from arrogant males glorying in their Latin sensuality to shivering substitutes for men skulking behind rocks in order to avoid the merciless attentions of the flesh fiends.

  “Poor sods,” said Ted. “They started off as bull-fighters and ended up fighting for their balls.”

  You may think I exaggerate but you have never experienced those birds at first hand – at least I imagine you haven’t. Maybe by the time I write this—hey, why don’t you run down to the village store and buy a padlock, just to be on the safe side?

  Sidney watches what is happening and tries to be philosophical – at least I think that was the word he meant to use. You never quite know with Sidney.

  “Let ’em get on with it,” he says. “They’ll be shagged out by the time the paying customers get here.”

  Us old hands shake our heads at that one. We know our girls. When you screw for peace you screw with the strength of ten. Not that Sid is less than smack on the ball in many ways. He gets all the huts repaired, stops the locals using the piss houses as goat pens and even gets some of the toilets working. I can vouch for this latter success because one of the workmen manages to flush his plastic false teeth down the loo and they bob up beside Ted off Palm Beach two minutes later.

  “Bloody terrifying, it was,” he says. “I thought they were one of those tropical fish with nothing but teeth.”

  This incident underlines one of the fundamental weaknesses of Love Island’s plumbing arrangements and you soon learn to swim a fair distance from the shore unless you want to meet a few old friends.

  One disappointment is the failure to get Grunwald off the island. The sun must have affected him because when Ted goes to fetch him for the plane he tears all his clothes off and runs naked into the trees. He has only been seen occasionally since. At first, it was reckoned that hunger would drive him out, but now with only a couple of days left to the first guests arriving, Sid has ordered that pairs of shorts be left around the island in the hope that he will slip a pair on and not let down the tone of the place. It is much in Sid’s mind that some old Funfrall customers might wonder why their former Holiday Host is now frisking about in the altogether.